15 Jul Our New England Road Trip Itinerary

To me, the start of a new year always begins with autumn, my favourite season. I suppose that’s because for most of my life, September has brought with it change, a new academic year and the chance to start afresh with a batch of brand new notebooks and pens. I love the feel of autumn’s approach as the long summer evenings start to draw in and an Arctic nip taints the morning air, bringing with it the promise of orange-tinted leaves, silver frosts and bonfire night.

*Update: you can read our complete 2016 New England Fall Foliage Guide here. This includes tips on where and when to see the best foliage, what to eat, which festivals to visit, how much our fall trip to New England cost and our favourite destinations in New England.*

For the last two years I have missed autumn; the routine cycling of the seasons has been erased by Asia’s sunshine and humidity. Even living in Hanoi, where it got cold enough to wear a coat, the air was still strangely humid and lacking that cold crispness we’re so used to in the UK. While I love warm weather, after two years of sweltering heat in Asia and smothering myself in sun cream, the Brit inside of me longs for frost and snow, for days cool enough to zip up a coat and wrap myself in a blanket. Luckily, this year we’ve chosen the perfect place to experience a spectacular autumn and kick-off a brand new phase of our adventure: New England.

I have long since dreamed of experiencing a New England fall, so much so that I’m a bit scared the reality won’t match up to my expectations. I have this picture in my head of sprawling farms, quaint little towns full of wood-clad houses with huge porches, vast forests and lakes, jagged coastlines and white lighthouses. When I think of our eight-week road trip I imagine driving through an autumn of orange pumpkin patches, famer’s markets, red-brown leaves and alongside windswept beaches. Have you ever visited New England; are my imaginings anywhere close to the truth?

New England Road Trip Itinerary

The New England fall foliage is supposed to be pretty spectacular, which means that we’re visiting at an expensive time. After several years in super-cheap Asia, the cost of travelling in the U.S is no doubt going to hit us hard. To try and lower costs we’ve already reserved our hire car and booked all of our accommodation in advance through Airbnb, which turned out to be cheaper than hotels, guesthouses or even hostels. We’re paying on average around £30 ($45) per night for our accommodation and we’re hoping that we’ll get to meet some lovely hosts who can give us some local insights in the process. Booking ahead also means we now have a definitive itinerary for our trip, here it is:

Boston, Massachusetts, 8 days – we fly into New York on the 2nd September. From there we’ll take a bus to Boston where we’ll spend a week getting to know the city before we pick up our rental car.

Effingham, New Hampshire, 5 days – since we’re staying close to the White Mountains we have plenty of walking planned for our stay in New Hampshire.

Pawtucket, Rhode Island, 7 days – from here we want to check out Providence and take the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket; these islands were too expensive for us to stay on.

Buffalo, New York, 3 days – a day’s drive will take us over to visit Niagara Falls.

Rockingham, Vermont, 7 days – we’re heading back east to southern Vermont, where we’ll be staying near the Green Mountain National Forest.

Bristol, Vermont, 7 days – now it should be time to drive north and catch the fall foliage in action. As well as checking out the countryside, farms and towns we’re excited to visit Burlington, which sounds like a vibrant city.

Swanville, Maine, 7 days – time to chase the foliage across to a converted barn in Swanville, which we’ll use as a base to explore the northern coast and Bangor.

Portland, Maine, 7 days – autumn should be in full swing as we drive down the famous coast towards Portland, where we’re excited to experience an American Halloween for the first time!

Fall River, Massachusetts, 3 days – we’re ending our trip back in Massachusetts, from there we’ll drive over to visit Cape Cod.

Boston, Massachusetts, 5 days – after returning our rental car we’ll spend a final few days in Boston, a city which I fully expect us to fall for.

The fun doesn’t stop once our road trip is over; next we’ll catch the bus down to visit Philadelphia and Washington DC. Our trip ends in New York visiting Andrew’s relatives; we have a week of intense sightseeing and our first Thanksgiving to experience before we fly back to England on the 28th November.

Slow Travel Promise

Most people spend just two or three weeks visiting New England in the fall, so I know that our eight-week road trip sounds pretty lavish. What we have learnt from travelling over the last couple of years though, is that slower travel works better for us. Although we had a great time at the beginning of our trip in New Zealand and Australia, for example, we also totally burnt ourselves out zipping backwards and forwards at a frantic pace. For this trip we plan to take things slow and steady so we can explore more in-depth and enjoy some rest days.

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What do you think of our New England itinerary, can you recommend any places for us to visit?

Amy

Rosie Thomas

As you’ve already booked everything it’s probably a bit late to say so, but if you get the chance to go over the bridge to Canada when you’re at Niagara, the view of the falls from that side is magnificent! As you’re British, should be no problem at the border.

Amy

Nice! Sergey’s family called Hamden home for about 15 years — we have some good recommendations there — of course the pizza (try Dayton’s street — off the beaten track but oh so good), Sleeping Giant park, andEast Rock park with the hill that you can climb from where you can see the city.

Amy

Kate

I’ve had two work trips this year to Burlington, Vermont (Univ of Vermont) and it was really lovely. Hope to get back there in the fall as I experienced winter (not again please) and then summer. People are lovely and scenery great but the prices of food — wow. It was like eating in Dubai!! I hope the rest of the region is not the same. Food was well done though. But if you are nearby Burlington, the outdoor area in the middle of the city is fun for strolling around — very cafe/pub scene.

Amy

Burlington sounds awesome (apart from the food prices!), we’re really excited about visiting. We’re planning lots of picnics and home-cooked meals when we have access to kitchens so hopefully that will lower the overall cost of food; I’m sure we will still end up splurging though!

Fantastic itinerary! I am sure it will be amazing, I loved that photo of the Autumn scenery and it will be so nice to immerse yourselves into it by travelling slowly and experiencing things like Halloween and Thanks Giving. I can’ t wait to follow your journey. I expect your pictures will be fabulous.

Amy

Looks like you’re going to have an amazing adventure in New England. The itinerary looks perfect, not too long in each place but not too much hectic travelling. It will be great especially in the Autumn, obviously the best time to go to that part of the US. I’d love to do a similar trip in the next year or so, it’s so difficult to choose which part of the States to visit though as it’s just so big.

Have an amazing time and I look forward to following you throughout your trip.

Andrew

Thanks Jonno, we’re really excited about our trip and have been planning it for some time now. We will have to see the USA in installments it seems, too big to do in one trip! I hope you get there yourself soon! 🙂

Andrew

I think 8 weeks in New England sounds fantastic! Abi and I have traveled to 35 states (I think) but we have yet to visit Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Rhode Island so we’d love to make a similar road trip. Our first glimpse at the fall foliage here on the east coast was way beyond anything we experienced in OR and we’re definitely looking forward to our first full fall season, especially since fall is my favorite season. You won’t be disappointed. You’re coming to D.C.?! We’d love to get together! 🙂 In the meantime, while you’re planning, let me know if I can help with D.C. info.

Andrew

Hi Patti, I think 35 states is pretty good, I’m sure that’s a higher proportion of the USA than we’ve seen of the UK! We’ve heard nothing but great things about the New England fall foliage so we’re understandably excited! We’d love to meet up in D.C., that would be awesome, Amy will message you on FB about it. 😉

[…] autumn prices in New England we booked our accommodation months ago through AirB&B, so we already have an itinerary planned. Today we went through our clothes and gear, which really helped us get everything organised. We […]

Not sure you can visit the Boston area without at least heading 18 miles north for a day trip to Salem…..my home town and the Witch City. All of the North Shore is SO historic and beautiful…..Beverly Farms, Marblehead, Gloucester and definitely Rockport. Happy travels!

[…] below and a jagged, dark skyline formed by the Green Mountains on the horizon. Suddenly the famous New England foliage was all around us, in the golden hues of the trees lining the road and the coloured […]

[…] Spending almost two years in Asia really helped keep our travel costs down. On average, travelling in Asia cost us just over £1,000 a month, which is less than half what we used to spend in a month just living and working in London. This has balanced out the more expensive trips we’ve taken in Australia, New Zealand, Scotland and the three-month trip we’re currently taking in America. […]

[…] countries like the UK, New Zealand, Australia and America. For example, when researching our autumn road trip through New England, we were staggered to find that most hotels charge between $100 and $200 per night and the few […]

[…] one of my favourite travel experiences to date. During our three-month stay we took an epic autumn road trip through New England, visited mighty Niagara Falls and hit up the bright lights of New York City, Philadelphia and […]

[…] Rhode Island is both the smallest state and the one with the longest official name: Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. As we discovered, Rhode Island’s small presence on the map can be misleading, as it is in fact home to many important historical events and some of the most beautiful places we’ve discovered so far in New England. […]

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About Us

We’re Amy and Andrew, a British couple currently in the midst of our greatest adventure. In March 2013 we quit our jobs, left our home in London and said goodbye to everyone we know to travel the world indefinitely. Read more…